Force Field Analysis

Force Field Analysis was created by Kurt Lewin in the 1940s. Lewin originally used it in his
work as a social psychologist. Today, however, it is also used in business, for making and
communicating go/no-go decisions.

The idea behind Force Field Analysis is that situations are maintained by an equilibrium between
forces that drive change and others that resist change, as shown in figure 1, below. For change to
happen, the driving forces must be strengthened or the resisting forces weakened.

The tool is useful for making decisions by analyzing the forces for and against a change, and for
communicating the reasoning behind your decision

Step 1: Describe Your Current Situation

In terms of University of Lahore, there are no health and safety trainings or policies that can
create awareness amongst students and the faculty about the potential hazards that one can face
in a university environment.

With regards to the environment that pertains to our city, the air continues to get toxic day by
day, affecting the lives of thousands of people who live here. The smog that visits us in every
winter is a serious problem and continues to harm human health. Ground-level ozone, sulphur
dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide are especially harmful for senior citizens,
children, and people with heart and lung conditions such as emphysema, bronchitis, and asthma.
This situation is only exacerbating. Nothing is being done to counteract it.
Step 2: Define Your Target Situation

The target situation at University of Lahore would be a safe environment where health and safety
hazards are identified and corrected and faculty, staff, and students are encouraged to develop
programs to identify, to report and to correct potential hazards.

The target situation in case of smog would be an atmosphere where the air is pure, clean and lies
in the safe zone in the Air Quality Index (AQI).

Step 3: Brainstorm Forces Which Drive You To Achieve Your Target Situation

The following driving forces take us toward our target situation,

 Outdated policies regarding health and safety

 Constant health risk due to smog
 Increase in potential hazards in UOL
 Lack of risk assessment
 Lack of risk-based emergency management programs
 No illness and injury prevention programs
 No awareness regarding health and safety amongst students

Step 4: Brainstorm Forces Which Will Restrain You From Achieving Your Target
Situation

 Fear of the unknown

 Existing organizational structures
 ‘That’s not how we do it here’ attitude
 Budgetary restraints
 Lack of incentives
 No government policies that demand implementation of safety policies

Step 5: Analyze The Forces

Analyzing these forces show us that amongst the driving forces, ‘lack of awareness’ and
‘constant health risk’ are the two most important driving forces that have the largest impact on
change. Taking the restraining forces into account, ‘lack of incentives’ and ‘existing
organizational structures’ are the most significant factors and these need to be tackled in order to
implement change.
Step 6: Develop your change strategy/action plan

To bring about a change in the University of Lahore, the following action plan should be
implemented.

1. Develop training programs that create awareness regarding maintenance of safety and
health in an organization.
2. Ensure proper hands-on training activities for students and the faculty to give basic
training regarding CPR and fire safety.
3. Provide medical surveillance/equipment at all times for any injury or illness.
4. Provide trained medical practitioners who can look after any illness/injury on university
premises.

To reduce or eliminate smog, the following measures should be taken,

1. Use public transport more.

2. Closing brick kilns that fail to use fuel-efficient technology.
3. Fining polluting vehicles and farmers burning rice stubble.
4. Curbing emissions from factories.